My Man Pendleton (30 page)

"And just where is it that you want him, Kit? Do you even know? Besides spread-eagle, belly-up, food for the buzzards, I mean."

She seemed to give his question great thought before finally replying, "I never wanted to make him food for the buzzards. He is kind of cute, after all. I'm sure I could find
some
use for him."

"Other than as a revenge tool against Dad, you mean."

She made a face. "Please, Holt. You make me sound so conniving."

"Hey, if the shoe fits
…"

She sighed heavily, an empty, defeated sound, but she said nothing to contradict his allegation.

So Holt told her, "Dad might not know what you're up to, little sister, but I do. And I don't like it."

She glanced away, but not before he saw the flicker of anguish that skittered across her features. "I have no idea what you're talking about," she said softly.

"Oh, yes you do. You're letting Dad think that you and Pendleton are building a little love nest together, just to lull him into a false sense of security and make him think you'll be getting married soon. That way, he'll leave you alone, and you can jerk the rug right out from under him at the last minute."

"I am
not
building a love nest with Pendleton," she denied. But he found curious the two bright spots of pink that stained her cheeks.

"No, what you're building is a house of cards," he told her. "And it's going to come down on you eventually. You might be able to fool Dad for a little while, but not for long. He only has a little over a month left to get you married. And once he finds out what you're up to…"
Holt deliberately left the statement unfinished, knowing that Kit would draw far worse conclusions if left to her own devices.

When she glanced back over at him, her expression divulged nothing of what she was thinking. "Are you going to tell him?"

Holt shook his head. "I ought to, but I won't."

"Why not?"

"Because I think it's important that you come to your senses on your own. Not because someone jerked you there against your will."

She eyed him in silence for a moment, but he had no way of knowing whether she would heed his suggestion.

"Did you know he's originally from
New Jersey
?" she asked instead.

Holt arched his eyebrows at the quick change of subject. "Pendleton?"

She nodded. "And did you know he has a big ol' Harley hog?
And
he likes R&B?
And
he used to be married?
And
before he came to work for Hensley's, he was working for a nonprofit organization that helped underprivileged kids?"

"Pendleton?"

She nodded.
"Yeah,
boy, you think you know a corporate drone and then,
bam.
He pulls a stunt like this."

"Like what?"

"Like turning into a human being."

Holt laughed. "So you like him then?"

"No," she said too quickly.
"Yes,"
she then amended just as rapidly. She sighed as she tangled her fingers nervously together in her lap. "Oh, I don't know."

Holt chuckled. "Maybe Dad was right. Maybe Pendleton is the man for you."

"Don't get cocky," she muttered. But her heart clearly wasn't in the admonition.

Holt sipped his soda and loosened his tie and tried to pinpoint when, exactly, his little sister had stopped being such a doormat. He didn't have to think long. Because he recalled the exact moment with crystal clarity, even though he'd been three sheets to the wind at the time. The reading of their mother's will. Scarcely two seconds after Abernathy had apprised them of the conditions surrounding their mother's final wishes, Kit had scooped up the McClellan scepter and run like the wind. And none of them had come close to catching up with her.

Once the shock of their mother's last will and testament had worn off, the McClellan men at first hadn't felt particularly concerned about the problem. Marrying off Kit wasn't such a big deal. She'd been trying to have a relationship with one kind of loser or another since she was fifteen. Just because the McClellan men had chased—or paid—them all off didn't mean there wouldn't be others.

Hey, Kit wasn't half-bad-looking, Bart had reminded them. As long as the lights weren't too bright. And despite her abrasiveness, Dirk had added, she could be fun. Sometimes. And she was smart, too, Mick had thrown in. Maybe a little too smart on occasion. But surely a man could overlook those things in light of millions of dollars, couldn't he? Why worry about some silly little condition of the trust, right?

Yeah, right.

They should have known better, Holt thought now. And they should have given Kit a little more credit, long before Mama died.

"So how are things going with your new girlfriend?" she asked suddenly, pulling him out of his reverie.

Although he knew perfectly well who Kit was talking about, he feigned confusion. "Girlfriend? What girlfriend?"

She clearly wasn't buying any of it. "Oh, come on. You remember," she said, "that sweet blond creature you were entertaining in the dining room the night Pendleton brought me home from the
Caribbean
. Faith Ivory of the Louisville Temperance League, I believe you introduced her as?"

"Oh, her."

"Yeah, her. How are things going?"

"They're not."

"Oh."

Neither of them said anything further for a moment, and just as Holt opened his mouth to change the subject, Kit opened hers to keep it right where it was.

"You really like her, don't you?" she asked.

It would be pointless to lie, Holt thought. Kit wasn't stupid, after all. Hadn't they all learned that the hard way? "Yes," he said, staring down into his glass, if not at his sister. "I like her very much."

"Why?"

He shrugged. "I honestly don't know." Now he glanced up at Kit, searching her face as if she might somehow give him the answer he was searching for. "But I can't stop thinking about her. There's something there between us. I just can't
…
I just don't…"
He sighed restlessly, unable to complete the thought.

"So call her," Kit told him, as if that were the solution to all the varied and numerous obstacles facing him and Faith.

"I did better than that. I went to see her in person."

"And?"

"And she made it clear that she doesn't want to see me."

"Why not?"

"Her late husband was an alcoholic," he said. "He treated her badly. She has a small problem with trust." There, he thought. Succinct and to the point. All done.

Not quite, he then realized when he looked over to find Kit gaping at him. "You told her about your drinking?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Boy, you must
really
like her."

Yeah, you could say that,
he thought. But aloud, he only said, "And although she thinks my overcoming my problem is admirable, she's by no means convinced that I won't, in a moment of weakness, do something stupid like, oh
…
fall off the wagon and turn mean."

"That's ridiculous," Kit said. "You'll never fall off the wagon. And you couldn't be mean if your life depended on it."

"Yeah,
well tell her that."

"Maybe I will."

He eyed her warningly. "Don't you dare. Stay out of this, Kit. This is between me and Faith. And it's over now. She's not going to come around."

Kit said nothing in response, something that troubled him greatly. So in an effort to change the subject and dispel any crazy schemes she might be cooking up in that wily head of hers, he hurried on, "I still can't believe Pendleton hasn't tossed you out by now. Not unless there's more to this arrangement, in spite of the sleeping assignments, than you're letting on."

Kit sighed, obviously disappointed by the lob back into her own court. "Well, he doesn't have much choice, does he? If I come crying back to Daddy that Pendleton doesn't love me anymore, Daddy will fire him."

"Pendleton's a savvy guy," Holt said. "He could find work anywhere he wants."

"Not at the stud rate Daddy's paying him."

"There are some things in life that are more important than money," Holt said, surprised at how easily the words rolled off his tongue.

Kit burst into laughter. "Oh, right. Listen to you. You'd shrivel up and die without Mama's millions."

"And you wouldn't?"

She sobered, but dropped her gaze instead of meeting his. "I couldn't care less about Mama's money. Ninety-nine-point-four million bucks could go a long, long way in the right hands. And Mama picked out some fine, fine charities."

Holt nodded. "Have you really thought about what your life would be like if all our money were taken away from us? Even with Abernathy handling the funds for the last two years, your life hasn't changed one bit since Mama's death. You still get your more than generous allowance. You're still free to do whatever you want. But if all that money were jerked out of your hands, what do you think your life would be like?"

"It would probably be ninety-nine-point-four million times better," she told him.

He shook his head. "You're used to living this way, Kit. Deny its importance all you want, but if you suddenly couldn't walk into Cherrywood whenever it suited you, if you couldn't use your charge card on whatever struck your fancy, if you had to go out and get a job—"

"A
job?"
she interrupted him, her expression troubled, as if she hadn't considered that aspect of the real world.

He chuckled. "Well, honey, ain't nobody else out there who's going to support you. You'd have to support yourself. And what kind of salary do you think you'll draw with your résumé?"

She fidgeted. "Well. I do have a college degree. Two college degrees, as a matter of fact."

"A BA in liberal arts and an MA in philosophy," Holt reminded her. "Oh, yeah. Those and all that professional experience you have—your most recent position was as a bartender, I believe, and lasted all of twenty-four hours—well, hey, your résumé ought to catch anyone's eye."

She lifted a shoulder and let it drop. "So I'll work as a bartender to support myself."

This time Holt was the one to laugh. "It would almost be worth sacrificing a hundred million dollars to see that. But maybe you should stop thinking about yourself for a minute, and start thinking about everyone else you're going to affect with this adolescent attitude you have."

She gaped at him. "Adolescent? Excuse me?"

Holt dropped his gaze down into his glass, watching as the tiny, crystalline bubbles snapped and fizzed. "Do you remember what you did the day after Mama's will was read?"

Kit kept silent, but he knew she was remembering that day as well as he did.

"You
came into my bedroom when the sun was at its peak," he continued, "and you threw open all the curtains so that I was blinded by the light."

"I remember," she said softly.

"Then you dragged me out of bed and poured me a cup of coffee. And as I sat there sipping it, you pulled out a notebook and enumerated for me, in stark, colorful detail, each and every incident in which I had embarrassed myself or my family or my coworkers with my drinking."

"It had gone on long enough, Holt. I just wish I had done it while Mama was still alive."

He nodded. "Do you remember how long it took for you to list all of those incidents that you had so thoughtfully recorded for so many years?"

"All day," she said. "And all night."

He nodded, too. "All damned day. And all damned night."

"But you haven't had a drink since then," she reminded him.

He dipped his head forward in acknowledgment. "No. I haven't. And I don't think I ever thanked you."

She smiled at him. "Yes, you did. You haven't had a drink since then."

Holt considered her for a moment in silence, then he roped his arm around her neck, pulled her close and placed a loud, smacking kiss at the crown of her head. Kit laughed, but shoved him away, then rose and went to retrieve a club soda for herself. That was the McClellan way, he thought. Reach out impulsively, touch briefly, pull back quickly. No harm done. Mama had been the only one who was able to hug for any length of time.

Holt sighed. "Now, I have the chance to pay you back, Kit."

She had remained on the other side of the room, clearly needing some space after that overwhelming display of emotion they had just shared. Now she strode slowly back toward him, but dropped into a chair opposite the loveseat.

"No payback necessary," she assured him.

"You're going to get it anyway." He made himself comfortable and watched her closely as he spoke. "These days, it's you who's trying to self-destruct," he said. Immediately, she opened her mouth to object, so he sliced his hand through the air to cut her off. "Your behavior over the last two years has been selfish, juvenile, and unfeeling."

"Must be in the genes," she managed to fire off while he was taking a breath.